Taverna Mykonos

It was time to enjoy another birthday dinner for dad since my sister was home to celebrate this time. We were in the mood for Greek and headed to Taverna Mykonos on Broadway in Elmwood Park. It’s the sister restaurant of Oceano’s in Fair Lawn.

I’ve ordered take out from here a few times and really liked it. It was usually the gyros and souvlaki platters.

We arrived for a fairly early dinner on a Sunday. Only a couple of tables were occupied at the time. We were seated at a booth along the far wall.

The decor was bright and simple.

We were given a bread basket and the table had extra virgin olive oil for dipping.

They had a selection of Greek wines. I really haven’t had Greek wines before and was curious to try one. My trip to Greece was coming soon and I was trying to become more familiar with the types of wine. My sister ordered a Assyrtiko from Santorini and I went with a Restina from Attica. It had notes of citrus and ginger, very good.

I suggested the Saganaki for an appetizer. Who doesn’t like fried cheese? It’s a Vlahotiri cheese pan seared in olive oil until crispy.

Saganaki

Dress it with extra olive oil and a squeeze of lemon and you have a tasty dish. It was nice and crispy. The cheese is firm and the lemon gives it a nice zest.

My sister ordered a trio of Mediterranean spreads as her entre. She chose the Hummus (puréed chickpeas), Melizanosalata (puréed eggplant), and Skordalia (puréed garlic and potatoes).

Trio of Spreads

It came with plenty of pita to spread on. I was a big fan of the Melizanosalata. The eggplant is puréed with garlic, lemon juice, fresh herbs, and extra virgin olive oil.

My mom loves whole fish so she went with the grilled house specialty fish. That night, it was red snapper. It’s charcoal grilled with ladolemono, a Greek lemon vinaigrette.

Grilled Red Snapper

The whole fish was served with a side of baked lemon potatoes.

I’m always tempted to order Chilean Sea Bass whenever I see it on a menu. I have yet to have one that I didn’t enjoy. So of course, I went with the Chilean Sea Bass special. It was oven baked and served over an onion and potatoes hash topped with a tomato sauce.

It was excellent! The sea bass was super tender and seasoned perfectly. The potatoes were browned and crispy and the tomato sauce had some nice slivers of garlic. Delicious!

We had to order some dessert and decided to share a couple. The Summer in Santorini was vanilla cake with blueberry yogurt mousse and raspberry mousse. It was served with poached blueberries and vanilla ice cream. It was a refreshing dessert due to all the berry flavors.

The warm chocolate cake was served with a mixed berry purée and vanilla ice cream. Cant go wrong with chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream.

We were served some complimentary Greek walnut cookies to end the meal. Everything was very good and I would like to go back to try the other seafood dishes with a nice glass of Greek wine.

Everybody enjoyed their dinner at Taverna Mykonos. The fish was excellent and since it’s so closeby, I’ll definitely be coming back!